Secure Scuttlebutt

This article is about the communication protocol. For the slang term, see Scuttlebutt.

Secure Scuttlebutt
Original author(s)Dominic Tarr[1]
Developer(s)Secure Scuttlebutt Consortium[2]
Initial release11 May 2014; 10 years ago (2014-05-11)
Repositorygithub.com/ssbc/ssb-server
Written inJavaScript
Operating systemmacOS, Linux, Windows
Available inEnglish
TypeDistributed social network, protocol, secure communication
LicenseMIT license
Websitewww.scuttlebutt.nz Edit this at Wikidata

Secure Scuttlebutt (SSB) is a peer-to peer communication protocol, mesh network, and self-hosted social media ecosystem.[3][4] Each user hosts their own content and the content of the peers they follow, which provides fault tolerance and eventual consistency.[5] Messages are digitally signed and added to an append-only list of messages published by an author.[6] SSB is primarily used for implementing distributed social networks, and utilizes cryptography to assure that content remains unforged as it is propagated through the network.[7][8]

In contrast to the major corporate social media platforms, user data and content on Secure Scuttlebutt is not monetized, there are no software design decisions being made in order to maximize user engagement or boost marketing metrics, and there is no paid advertising.[9] According to Forbes, "Scuttlebutt itself isn't supported by venture capital. Instead ... Scuttlebutt is backed by grants that helped jump-start the process ... [and] there are now hundreds of users who personally donate to the cause and an estimated 30,000 people using one of at least six social networks on the protocol".[10]

  1. ^ "Initial commit". GitHub. 11 May 2014. Retrieved 17 January 2019.
  2. ^ "Secure Scuttlebutt Consortium". GitHub. 2019. Retrieved 17 January 2019.
  3. ^ Tarr, Dominic; Lavoie, Erick; Meyer, Aljoscha; Tschudin, Christian (September 2019). "Secure Scuttlebutt: An Identity-Centric Protocol for Subjective and Decentralized Applications". Proceedings of the 6th ACM Conference on Information-Centric Networking. ICN '19. pp. 1–11. doi:10.1145/3357150.3357396. ISBN 9781450369701.
  4. ^ "Dweb: Social Feeds with Secure Scuttlebutt – Mozilla Hacks - the Web developer blog". Mozilla Hacks – the Web developer blog. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  5. ^ "Scuttlebutt Protocol Guide". ssbc.github.io. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  6. ^ Bogost, Ian (22 May 2017). "The Nomad Who's Exploding the Internet Into Pieces". The Atlantic. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  7. ^ "Introduction · GitBook". www.scuttlebutt.nz. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  8. ^ "In The Mesh - Scuttlebutt, A Decentralized Alternative To Facebook". In the Mesh. 19 April 2018. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  9. ^ Mannell, Kate; Smith, Eden T. (14 September 2022). "It's hard to imagine better social media alternatives, but Scuttlebutt shows change is possible". The Conversation. Archived from the original on 28 September 2022. Retrieved 28 September 2022.
  10. ^ del Castillo, Michael (11 September 2022). "Jack Dorsey's Former Boss Is Building A Decentralized Twitter". Forbes. Archived from the original on 15 October 2022. Retrieved 15 October 2022.